Sunday, September 06, 2009

On July 23rd, Glenn Beck began his crusade against Van Jones, calling him "a communist-anarchist radical." He went on to rail against Jones approximately 20 times on Fox News in the past couple of months. Last Friday, Beck cited "former black nationalist, avowed communist Van Jones" as an example of "the true danger" of Obama's "czars." Prior to joining the administration, Jones had co-founded Color of Change, an organization that successfully convinced 57 advertisers to drop Beck’s program in just a matter of weeks after Beck called Obama a "racist."

An obvious response from folks who think there is something wrong with the Obama administration being deprived of one of the smartest, most conciliatory, and most imaginative of contemporary social activists is to ramp up the Color of Change campaign against right wing demagoguery.

But also, those of us from the activist community need to look at the structural weakness of Van's position that meant that he would probably be forced out in a storm.

His history is an example of a common trajectory among progressive social activists: horror and disaffection on encountering racism, police lawlessness, wars without end, planetary destruction. Where Van is different from many has been his series of creative efforts to find answers, not just stew and reject. And as a consequence, his resume is littered with stuff that didn't go very far, but that provides ammunition to his enemies. And those experiences of loose ends and dead ends are what make him such a powerful advocate for practical solutions to poverty and environmental degradation with social conciliation.

But can a person with a life trajectory so vulnerable to right wing smears survive in the public arena? Possibly -- but only if he can show he has an electoral base. When you get out in public because some subset of the people voted to put you there, a progressive activist's past can become an asset, even though enemies will still smear it.

Two examples come to mind: Tom Hayden who rose to the top of the California State legislature after prominent leadership in the anti-Vietnam war movement and current Assemblyman Tom Ammiano who won nearly universal health care for San Franciscans after starting in politics known as a screaming queen gay comedian and school teacher. People with unconventional pasts can work their way into positions of power and influence -- but they have to come in through the voters. They can't derive their positions from appointment by others -- it's too easy for opponents to make them a dispensable political liability.

Unfortunately, progressives in Van's generation -- folks whose youthful experience of politics was Ronald Reagan's plastic hypocrisy -- usually didn't think going to the voters offered much hope of change. The fact that our current President did do so is one of his unique attributes, along with his threading a path around the additional hurdle he had to jump to be attractive across racial lines.

The lesson I draw from watching Van Jones pushed out is that progressives who want power not only have to organize vigorously from the sidelines (we do), but also get in deeper, winning solid electoral power bases.

What is this blog for?

This San Francisco purveyor of graffiti has it right. When times are bleak -- when country and planet sink under the barely restrained sway of greed, raw power, and fear -- it's time to restate what matters.

I write here to preserve and kindle hope for a national and global turn toward multi-racial, economically egalitarian, gender non-constricting, woman affirming, and peace choosing democracy that preserves the habitability of earth for all. There's a big order -- but what else is there to do but struggle for this? Not much.

Topics range from the minuscule to the transcendent to the global, from dire to delightful. I am not an optimist, but I refuse to allow myself to wallow within the easy bias that everything is going to always be awful. Good also happens; love lives too.

I've been yammering here about activism, politics, history, racism and other occasional horrors and pleasures since 2005. I intend to continue as long as the opportunity exists. In this time, that means activism and chronicling resistance. Perhaps it always has, one way and another.

About Me

I'm a progressive political activist who runs trails and climbs mountains whenever any are available. I've had the privilege to work for justice in Central America (Nicaragua and El Salvador), in South Africa, in the fields of California with the United Farmworkers Union, and in the cities and schools of my own country. I'm a Christian of the Episcopalian flavor; we think and argue a lot. For work, I've done a bit of it all: run an old fashioned switch-board; remodeled buildings and poured concrete; edited and published periodicals, reports and books; and organized for electoral campaigns. Will work for justice.